Blog Archives

In the spirit of the holiday season, AB&I partnered with UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland to donate gifts to the children spending Christmas in the hospital. Team members were encouraged to bring new, unwrapped gifts to the HR department and the response was overwhelmingly generous. It was truly an honor to help make a difference in a child’s life during the holiday season.

Futurecom team members held their annual Christmas luncheon on December 7 at Destiny Banquet Hall in Woodbridge, Ontario. Team members enjoyed a wonderful lunch and were treated to a murder mystery production of Silence of the Hams put on by BigTime Productions.

Team members were active participants in the production including Dave Ray, Senior Director of Engineering, who performed an Academy Award winning death scene. Other team members participated by showing some fantastic dance moves.

The entire Futurecom team would like to wish all our customers and vendors a very happy holiday season and a prosperous 2018!

AB&I held their second annual ugly Christmas sweater contest, and boy did everyone bring it! All of the ladies wore something festive, and enjoyed a BBQ lunch before the judges picked their top five winners.

The Manchester Tank Elkhart team continued a 10-year tradition of participating in the annual Salvation Army Adopt-a-Family program. With donations from Manchester/McWane, as well as their management team, they were able to make Christmas a little bit brighter for families in need.

This program is designed to assist families who are in crisis as the result of unemployment, homelessness, medical issues, or other difficult circumstances, and who otherwise would not have the resources to celebrate Christmas. Families who are adopted are provided with food, clothing, and gifts from sponsors.

The ladies on the second floor corporate team in Birmingham, Alabama held their annual Christmas luncheon and ugly Christmas sweater contest yesterday. They catered the food from Taco Mama and enjoyed lively Christmas music during the luncheon. This year Leslie Mawhorter won the award for ugliest Christmas sweater and Gretchen Easton won the award for the most creative sweater with her Green Bay Packers sweater. Teri Lavette won for the “most flammable” sweater with lots of colorful lights.

As in previous years, they had a lively game of dirty Santa, but everyone left with a smile on their face and a gift for Christmas.

We are pleased to announce that Clow Valve Company’s entry in the 2017 Oskaloosa, Iowa Christmas Parade won the Judges Choice Award!

The theme for this year’s entry was National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. The team was pretty excited because they haven’t come in first place since 2010.

Approximately 20,000 people, almost the entire town, showed up for this year’s parade. They had wonderful weather and a great staff at the Oskaloosa Area Chamber & Development Group pulled off another fantastic celebration. Events like this have a way of bringing the community together.

Clow Valve team member Bob Bateson said, “My biggest gift for managing this float is seeing the joy on the faces of the little ones.”

Big thanks to Roy Winkleman for lending his RV, Steve Davis for “bare”ing the cold to play cousin Eddie (it was a big hit), James Jennings and Kaden Linder (the prince and princess), Julie Isley (local artist) and the other 20+ people that donated their time to work on the winning project.